Press Release: Hunting for Zombies: Can You Tell If Your Internet-Connected Things Are Really Alive?

Don’t let Zombies eat your brains! ZENALERT is the no-stress platform designed for startups, device-makers, and IT admins, to collect data, receive alerts, and detect when your things are powered-off or offline.

LIGHTNING RELEASES 08/20/14 –Are you a developer of Internet-connected products? Do you have to keep processes, computers and servers under control? Or do you simply like to control the sensors you have scattered around your house? In all these cases, you need a simple and immediately deployable solution. ZenAlert (http://www.zenalert.com) is a simple, effective, standards-based and low-cost cloud-based platform, to take control of each and every Internet-connected object.

The ZenAlert alerting system is based on two types of HTTP call: the Vital Signal and the Event Signal.

Vital Signals are the object’s heartbeat, and communicate the vital state of an object. When this signal is missing the platform sends an alert notification to the object’s owner. In this way the inability to communicate becomes the first ally in understanding there is a problem.

Event Signals are sent to the platform when a specific event occurs, so the object’s owner can be alerted and collect data about it. Both signals are transmitted through a simple HTTP/HTTPS call. The firmware embedded in simple objects or software applications residing on a server or desktop computer can thus communicate with the platform using just a few lines of code, in any programming language. ZenAlert also provides ready-made client, freely available for Windows and Mac OSX, to handle the simple case in which just a computer and the processes running on it need to be monitored. Free, open source scripts are also available for Linux, Raspberry Pi, and Arduino. Developers, startups and device makers are then free to focus on the objects they are creating, without worrying about how to verify their correct functioning.

The monthly charge for a single object is one dollar. No limitations or compromises and maximum transparency, with a cost that is directly proportional to the number of the objects. Moreover, to allow users to test the system without commitment, the first object is always free.